Monday with Mounce

The translation of σάρξ has caused lots of grief over the years. BDAG gives it the semantic range of “flesh, physical body, a living being with flesh, human/mortal nature, earthly descent, the outward side of life.” Paul often uses it to describe the weak, sinful, human condition. So how should it be translated?

After three months of expensive and intensive work, I am pleased to announce that tomorrow the new BillMounce.com website will go live. You will be able to tell it's different although its functionality is basically the same. What's mostly changed is I have updated the infrastructure to a modern environment that will enable me to do things I couldn't do before. I want to especially thank those of you who have been donating to help cover the costs of these kinds of upgrades. 

A little textual criticism. Paul writes, “If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned (καυχήσωμαι), but have not love, I gain nothing” (ESV, KJV). Other translations follow a different variant. “If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast (καυχήσωμαι), but do not have love, I gain nothing” (NIV, also CBT, NRSV, NLT, NET).

Allowing for the fact that we all hear words a little differently, I was surprised to read that in many translations the Israelites really did not cross the Red Sea on dry ground. We’ve been tricked all these years! At least that is how I hear the “as” in Heb 11:29.

Language is imprecise. It would be great if all of us said exactly what we meant, and meant exactly what we said, but that is neither human nature or the nature of language. That’s why context is king. That’s why a “verse of the day” is the worse exegetical tool there is (sorry). In every class on Bible study methods (“hermeneutics”) that is taught, the central emphasis is context, reading verses in context. I heard a sermon the other day that illustrates the need for this emphasis, using the imperfect tense.